Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a method and apparatus for discovering a neighbor in a wireless communication system.
Description of the Related Art
Standards for Wireless Local Area Network (WLAN) technology have been developed as Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) 802.11 specifications. IEEE 802.11b may provide a maximum transfer rate of 11 Mbps, and IEEE 802.11a may provide a maximum transfer rate of 54 Mbps. IEEE 802.11g may use Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (OFDM) at 2.4 GHz, and provide a transfer rate of 54 Mbps. IEEE 802.11n may use Multiple Input Multiple Output (MIMO)-OFDM, and provide a transfer rate of 300 Mbps to four spatial streams. IEEE 802.11a and 802.11b use an unlicensed band at 2.4 GHz or 5 GHz. IEEE 802.11b provides a transmission rate of 11 Mbps and IEEE 802.11a provides a transmission rate of 54 Mbps. IEEE 802.11g applies Orthogonal Frequency-Division Multiplexing (OFDM) at 2.4 GHz to provide a transmission rate of 54 Mbps. IEEE 802.11n may use Multiple Input Multiple Output (MIMO)-OFDM, and provide a transfer rate of 300 Mbps to four spatial streams. IEEE 802.11n may support a channel bandwidth up to 40 MHz to provide a transfer rate of 600 Mbps.
IEEE 802.11ai is a standard for supporting fast initial link setup of an IEEE 802.11 station (STA). For example, technology for implementing fast initial link setup through an IEEE 802.11 Medium Access Control (MAC) layer has been developed through IEEE 802.11ai. For example, a legacy initial link setup scheme has disadvantages in that link setup of some users is largely delayed when many users simultaneously attempt to access a base station (BS) station (STA). The fast initial link setup may be necessary to solve the above problem of the legacy initial link setup scheme, or may also be used for other cases.
A legacy Internet Protocol (IP) setup process is carried out by a higher layer (e.g., an IP layer) after completion of an initial link setup process. In this case, a time for IP setup is additionally consumed after completion of initial link setup, such that it is difficulty to perform the initial link setup at high speed.